Last weekend I got a few seconds of footage snowboarding up north. I am not terribly impressed with the quality of the footage, but there are several reasons for that:

There is too much 2-dimensional action in this reel. The camera need not be moving, but should be placed in a location so as to add dimension.

The camera should not form a straight line with the subjects trajectory. When the subject is moving directly towards the camera, or directly away from it (as in this tape) there is no sense of depth or magnitude. Excuse the crude MSPaint drawing, but what I think should happen more often than not, is to position the Camera at point X, maximizing the angle AXC and also BXD where A is the starting point of the shot, C is the landing, B is the apex of the subject’s trajectory, and D is the effective “base” of the jump.

Moreover, we didn’t film nearly enough — just like taking pictures, 90% of what develops is crap. Film everything. Usually, stationary cameras 100 yards away don’t render the best visuals, especially in the snow where everything washes out and definition becomes a problem. Also, it helps to have a cameraman who is capable of following the subject down the hill. These are not disparaging remarks towards the camera man, it was only his fourth time on a snowboard, ever, although he does land a painfully slow-looking boardslide towards the end of the video. Just saying, a more able camera man will yield more and better footage.

So, at least we learned something. Enough jabbering, here’s the video: